Confirmed: US Was The 'Lone Holdout' In Refusing To Release ACTA Text

from the transparency? dept

Throughout the ACTA negotiations, the USTR insisted on two things: (1) it was being as transparent as possible in the negotiations and (2) that it simply couldn't agree to release the document because other countries would get upset and leave the negotiating table. Of course, while it later came out that a small group of countries were against transparency, almost all of those countries backed down on the transparency issue after that report was leaked. And, yet, there was still no transparency from the USTR. Why? Well, it's now come out that the USTR was "the lone hold out" on the issue -- mainly over whether or not the text that was still under negotiation would be released or not. Everyone else was fine with releasing the versions that still had text under discussion. The US alone refused. Not only that, but they had to fight hard to keep such text secret:

The Euros and some others push hard for release, but since it required consensus the text will not be released. We spent the final 3 hours arguing over all of this.

This is the sort of "transparency" that our government provides? They promise to be transparent, and everyone wants that transparency, but the USTR/Obama administration fights it. Shameful.